Face Forward
by Nepeace
Summary: Abby Sciuto thinking about Kate's departure and Ziva's arrival and her role in it.


**Face Forward ( Rivalry – Abby Sciuto )**

**Author:** Nepeace

**Skills Challenge: **_Write a short fic focusing on one characters emotions. Could be either anger, romance, curiousity etc! Aim here to be realistic and to really make the reader feel as if they are in the characters head. _**Rivalry – Abby Sciuto**

**Word Count:** 655 words

**Events: **Spoilers for Kate's departure and Ziva's arrival, but I am pretty sure that everyone has seen that by now.

**Authors notes:** A NFA skills workshop entry.

**Face Forward ( Rivalry – Abby Sciuto )**

She sat in her lab, loud music was blaring from the speakers. She knew that Gibbs hated it when she turned the volume to max and quite frankly she was glad that she worked in the basement. Since she was the only one here no one ever complained about her music. But right now she couldn't care less, she herself hardly noticed the music since she was lost in thought. She was trying to make sense of her own feelings.

Today six months ago was the day that Kate got shot, their colleague Caitlin Todd. And Abby still missed her dearly. Kate – though they where completely different, and they where an odd pair – had been her best friend.

Kate might not have been as open minded as Abby and she might not have understood all the things that Abby liked to do. She had accepted Abby for who she was and even despite the differences they where there for each other. But six months ago she had lost that in an instance without a warning and without a chance to say goodbye. She was still mad at herself for ignoring the dream that she had. She had a bad feeling when she got up that morning, but she ignored it.

And before she knew it the team got a replacement at first the guys had showed some weak attempts to stop the beautiful Israeli liaison officer from Mossad to infiltrate in their inner circles. But all attempts had prevailed prematurely and Kate's desk was taken hostage by the strange emotionless woman with the words 'Kate would not mind me sitting at her desk'. A Mossad assassin, that was at least what the rumor mill said.

Kate was killed by an Israeli terrorist, and Abby expected Officer David to be here to spy on them. She sure had Gibbs, McGee and Tony wrapped around her finger with her honey sweet accent and her mistaken American idioms. And even though Tony acted as if the mistakes that the Israeli made annoyed him, Abby knew better. She had watched him stare at her ass when he was sure that the Israeli had no idea that he was watching her.

McGee was just scared of her, he believed everything that was being said in the hallways. Able to kill a man with a paperclip eighteen different ways, Abby thought. She was able to kill a person without leaving a trace, that is who they should be scared off.

And then there was Gibbs, she had no idea what had gotten into him. At first he had wanted the Israeli gone as much as she wanted her gone but all of the sudden he had turned and now he accepted her completely. And Abby was sure that he wasn't scared of her because she had seen him headslap her like he does with Tony all the time.

Not to mention the Director, Jenny Shepard and Ziva David shared a past together. Though no one really knew what that meant – they had worked together on an Anti Terrorism Task Force in Europe and Egypt – they never heard any details on those missions. Not from Director Shepard nor from Ziva David or the rumor mill. But Abby was quite sure that Ziva couldn't do anything wrong in the Directors eyes.

And then Ducky, he had surprised her the most. He and Ziva took pleasure in drinking tea together on their breaks. Ducky never asked her to drink tea with him, not that she drank tea but that was besides the point.

The point was that she hated Ziva David because she replaced Kate in every single way. Except where she needed Ziva the most replacing Kate as her best friend. And though Abby did not act nice towards Ziva she should understand that she was grieving the loss of her best friend and that she needed a friend who could understand that.


End file.
